but what do you do when there's this great divide
by streetlightskeletons
Summary: Nightwing and Red Hood meet for the first time since the Lazarus Pit spat the latter out. Red Hood is brimming over with rage, Jason's mind doesn't want to him to remember, and Dick doesn't know how to speak to Jason without pissing off Red Hood. (Part 3 of Seer Series)


**A/N: Okay, so I didn't realise that the format was all messed up ( _embarrassing_ ), but it's hopefully all fixed now and easier to read lol. Thanks to all those who pointed the mistake out.**

Gotham was in Jason's blood; in his very soul. The deep ebony of his hair to the dull black of the tarmac on the city streets. His love for smoke and the city's lungs that breathed exhaust fumes day and night. The frantic, angry thoughts that plagued his head matched the constant chaos of Gotham's daily life, and he wasn't quite sure that he chose Gotham to come back to - more the other way around. This cursed city had dragged him back to its streets, kicking and screaming. Jason was a child of Gotham, whether he liked it or not.

He chuckled darkly to himself. With a wry smirk on his face, Red Hood stubbed his cigarette out on the roof ledge and flicked it over the edges, watching it flutter to the ground four storeys below. The butt of the cigarette didn't throw out a grapple to try and save itself, nor did it claw desperately at the outside of the building in order to slow its descent. His own thoughts were smothered under an oversized, itchy blanket that was folded and packed tightly inside his skull. But, in between the creases of the scrunched up blanket, someone was whispering and for a second, he wondered. He wondered what it would be like to follow the cigarette's lead.

A voice spoke from behind him. "That's littering, you know"

If he had been younger, he would have jumped. He would have scrambled to his feet, frantically yanking out his weapons to defend himself. He would have berated himself, knowing that that voice could have slit his throat while he had been lost in his own head. Older now, Jason had seen too much and been through too much to flinch at unexpected but familiar voices. He glanced over his shoulder and met the steady, if slightly worried, gaze of Nightwing.

Red Hood snorted. "You gonna take me in for it?"

"No"

At the admission, Red Hood turned around. Taking him in, he realised that the other man's hair reminded him of the stereo that a butler had stored up in the attic, a dark walnut wood. He had been devastated when the damn thing had stopped working. The only reason the old butler had kept it after it had broken was because of Jason – he loved that damn stereo like it was his own child, sitting in front of it for hours at a time. If he remembered correctly, which was unlikely, the other vigilante's hair was the colour of that broken stereo when a dusty beam of light from the cobweb-filled window in the attic would strike it _just right_.

"How'd you know I'd be here? You following me or somethin'?"

"I- I had a dream"

Jason snorted so loud he ended up choking. He laughed, an empty, manic thing, and said, "Oh _boy_ , that's a good one. Now, I _was_ told that Ritchie was starting to sell the pretty hard stuff on the corner of 9th, but I didn't believe it. Didn't really peg you as an experimenter, to be honest"

Instead of smirking, or laughing himself, Nightwing stood there, woodenly. If Jason had to guess, he would have said the look on his face was slightly crestfallen, as if someone had crushed any hope that he had just had. Hope for what, Jason didn't know – _understanding_ , perhaps? Usually he wouldn't of cared, and he didn't, but the look on Nightwing's face left a bitter taste of concern and sharp _regret_ in his mouth and he jolted as he felt a twinge of something in his chest. It was as if his torso were a well, and someone had just tossed a pebble in, the small rock bouncing off his each of his ribs as it travelled from his heart to his lower abdomen.

He felt like he had done something – or _said_ something – wrong. As if Nightwing had trusted him a deep, dark secret of his and he had just brushed him off. Red Hood didn't like feeling in the wrong – especially when he didn't understand _why_ he was wrong. He bristled internally.

It was quiet for a moment. Nightwing came and sat down beside him, storing his weapons – (" _They're just a pair of sticks, Dick" A cackle of electricity and a mocking voice, "You wanna come and say that to my face, little Robin?")_ – in his back holster. Red Hood had no intention of attacking him, but he didn't think that that was a smart move on Nightwing's behalf.

Said man stared straight ahead, his hair dancing delicately in the slight breeze. Jason, after a moment, followed his lead and looked away. He wondered how long the untroubled and hushed companionship would last between them.

Not very long apparently, as Nightwing stated firmly, sounding like he was trying to convince himself more than anyone else, as if he had arrived on the rooftop certain but wasn't so sure anymore, doubting himself, "I _know_ who you are"

"Kid," Red Hood chuckled mirthlessly, shaking his head. Jason knew this man sitting beside him was older, but the other vigilante seemed so naïve and untouched – _untainted_ \- that he couldn't help it. Jason, on the other hand, was aching and broken and he felt like he was barely alive at times. Sometimes nights, he would wake up and check his own breathing to ensure _that he was_. "You don't know _anything_ about me"

" _Jason-"_

One moment, he was idly swinging his legs over the ledge, having the first relaxed and nonthreatening conversation since he had returned. Then, in the next, he was up, standing, as was Nightwing. He didn't remember, but, somewhere between the action of sitting to standing, he had put a knife to the older man's throat. The blade winked at him in the faint glow from streetlights, as if they were sharing a joke.

Red Hood had his hand fisted in the collar of the vigilante's suit, tugging him in close. He appreciated and enjoyed – _immensely_ – the height advantage he had on the other man. Inside his head, Jason heard his younger self laugh – ( _"Look, Dickhead! I'm taller than you now-!" "Yeah, yeah, laugh it up, kid. Go ahead" "Guess who's the little brother now" "Watch it, I'm now at the perfect height to take out your kneecaps")_ and he shook himself, dismissing it.

He heard Nightwing's breath hitch, stretching up onto his toes to avoid slicing his own jugular as Jason pushed the blade up higher. Distracted, Red Hood's eyes left Nightwing's own suddenly unsure and hesitant ones and fell to his throat. The knife glinted and Jason doesn't even recognise it – he doesn't know where he had gotten it from in the first place, nor does he remember where he had hidden it in his suit when Red Hood had swiftly reached for it, feeling threatened.

"I _said_ ," Red Hood snarled, letting go of the man's collar and seizing his hair instead. Talking over Nightwing's pained hiss, he continued, snapping, "That _you don't know anything_ "

He shoved Nightwing back, watching impassively, face set and jaw clenched, as the vigilante stumbled back from his strength and probably in shock. Finding his feet on the gravel rooftop, he reached up and rubbed at his stinging neck, his glove glistening with blood as he dropped it back to his side. Jason started – he hadn't known that he had actually cut him. Judging by the small nick on the vigilante's throat, highlighted by the dribbling blood, he obviously had. Nightwing stayed deadly quiet, eyeing him warily.

Jason coughed and cleared his throat, balling his suddenly shaking hands into fists at his side. Nightwing hadn't hurt Jason, but Red Hood had hurt Nightwing. He shifted on his feet – why did he feel _guilty_ for that? All of a sudden, the pressure in his head increased and his eyes blurred for a second - _("You know I won't ever hurt you, Dick, right?" "Um, sure, kid. And I won't ever hurt you, either, okay?" "…Promise?" A hand on a chest and a small laugh, "Scout's honour, Jaybird")_

"Just…" Red Hood ground out roughly, shaking his head _, "Stay away from me,_ you hear?"

Nightwing nodded hesitantly in affirmation, so Jason jumped off the roof.

/

In between his seething anger and blinding pain, whenever his mind settled enough for him to breathe, he would see things.

In those moments, Jason would look to the future and see his own head whipping back; the back of his skull painting the dull, listless walls of his apartment a vibrant red – almost like a Jackson Pollock painting. He would feel his own eyes go dry and would hear the faint ringing of a gunshot blast in his ears. He would look to the future and know that if he ever tried to go back to the life he had, Red Hood would ensure that the back of his throat would kiss the nozzle of a gun. The past had hurt him, and he couldn't go back – Red Hood had to protect him, in any possible way.

In those moments, Jason would look to the future and would be startled when he would see that he didn't have one.

The thing was, he wasn't even suicidal. He just knew that he was living on borrowed time. Jason constantly felt empty and hollow, so Red Hood stayed angry, and blistering, because it was easier to be filled with rage than nothing at all.

 _(Only a few years later, he proved himself wrong. And in the manor's kitchen, crying with laughter at some joke Dick made, catching Damian as he nearly fell from his stool and handing Tim a tissue, he wondered why he ever thought that following a falling cigarette would have been better than this)_

 _(Dick never mentioned that night)_

 _(Jason would have been convinced that that night never happened if he didn't, occasionally, catch Dick wincing as he rubbed at his throat absentmindedly)_


End file.
